Looks like legit copies of Gran Turismo 5 have made it out.

The game runs in 1080i. Well, sort of. It's 640x540p upscaled. More info here:
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=26733

Still, it only runs in 480p or 1080i during race and replay. When it goes back to menus, it switches back to 480i. Also, everytime you play the game you have to enable 1080i mode:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/561066-gran-turismo-4/56771962
I don't know if the constant switching resolutions is bad for the TV. I just play the game on 480i on a CRT.

Also for some weird reason, only the US and JP versions of the game have this mode avaiable. No EU version has 1080i mode.

Videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lMYGZ5bSDU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9wksg7FE9k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6l9cmye1BzA&feature=related
http://vimeo.com/14179587

 

x

 

I don't think that is possible, is it? Or do you mean in terms of textures?

 

The games getting mixed reviews, from epic to disappointed. Can't wait to hear all of your reviews as I'm not sure whether to buy now or wait. Please Johnny and everyone post with opinions.

 

I won't have the game till next week or the other.

Still, from what i read:

Standards are a mixed bag. Some look great, others look terrible
Physics are great, improved AI and day/night transitions and weather are amazing
Online so far seems uninspiring, with no car class limits, jurassic code system for private lobbies.
Top Gear Test Track, but no Suzuki Liana, Chevrolet Lacetti or Kia Cee'd? WTF?!

IGN and SixthAxis have the most well-written reviews so far.

Anyway, like i said before, Kazunori and Polyphony Digital need to wake up. They're not alone in the market right now, and Forza has being doing stuff like online, car marketplace, livery editor and so on for quite some time. PD have still to catch up.

They need to have a bigger team, so they can release a game instead of taking half a decade. Ever since GTHD, they took some bad design decisions. Standards being one of them.

PD has to understand that if a game takes longer to be released, it will have bigger expectations.

 

Standards are just cars that they didn't have a priority flag on them. This means that time was of the essence apparently so considering that premiums make up 20% of the garage, then it would take at least a year longer to prepare the rest of the cars. Of course this would be unacceptable in terms of a release schedule but my guess is that they bit off more than they could chew.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qotsrSxyqXA

 

Hilarious video but the visuals are stunning. 1080p and 60fps gorgeous.

 

It`s a stupid bug, like many others in GT5. Probably the guys at GTPlanet are already making a list of bugs.

The premium cars look amazing, but i wonder if they could make them a little less detailed and have more time to add more cars. The standard cars that look great are the ones that were created for GT PSP, so they probably created them with high resolution textures. Some cars look like they were ported from a PS1 game. The shadows look terrible, an aliased mess. The smoke and weather effects make pixelization on the car edges. Yeah it runs on 1080p and 60fps, but with all those issues. Wouldn't be better to run on 720p and have more resource for these effects? I won't even start on the whole 3D hyped gimmick.

Im surprised that even after 6 years, they release a game that feels rushed. A game that costed over $60 million, according to Kaz himself. Bugs all over the place. Yes it looks and drives great, but it doesn't seem like a finished product, not even close.

Even Forza having lots of bugs on launch, at least their game didn't took half a decade to be released.

Kazunori Yamauchi and his team totally lost their focus on this one. GT1 created a genre, GT2 has so many content that most people (including me) still play it to this day, GT3 was mindblowing with it's graphics and new tracks like Monaco. GT4 improved over GT3, adding a huge list of cars and tracks like Le Mans and Nurburgring.

What we have in GT5 is basicly a rehash of the series in HD. GT Auto keeps being the same thing, just like the license tests and all the rest. There's no evolution. On GT4 they had a simple and very limited drag racing and some drift cars. On GT5 drag racing is nowhere to be seen (would be a cool online mode for tuned cars) and the drift is just a gimmick on arcade mode.

The Simulaton mode / GT Life hasn't evolved either, the car list continues to keep tons of japanese cars (why a daihatsu move over a vw scirocco?! why having the bugatti veyron as a standard?!), the track list didn't added anything new and exciting like Bathurst or Spa (in fact they removed favourites like Seattle and many others), and the online seems like something from the past decade (can't make a decent online part? Hire a team that can)

I'll play it to death because of the day / night transition over nurburgring and le mans, the amazing physics, the weather effects and to play with some fellow GT friends (even if the online sucks).

Sony better listen the fans complaints or they'll lose a big franchise. Kazunori needs a reality shock and see why lots of GT fans moved over Forza. They need a bigger and better team... fast.

I love the GT series, ever since the first one. I'm a fan but not a fanboy. Even though i haven`t played the game yet (and it might take a while), i'm very disappointed. This was the first time that it had happened.

I'll probably make a review as soon as i get it.

 

I assume they're still planning on having plenty of updates over time?

 

Alright picked it up tonight and played through a bit of it. Had a hard time putting it down actually.

1. Menus are fine and has more of a PC game feel with pop up message windows to give you updates. Even has a pc arrow you move around the screen. The IGN reviewer said it took him an hour to figure out where everything was, which is scary and sad.

2. The tracks and environments are what really draw you in over the cars, which do still look nice. I think I was enjoying the actual gameplay enough to where the lower res car models didn't bother me. I guess if you think what could have been then yes its disappointing but once you get into the collecting cars and races its all about the performance of the cars anyway. As with the older GTs, it has that definitive simulation feel. Also the Go Karts are a blast, if you need an arcade like fix.

3. Love the level up aspect, its GT with rpg elements, so essentially a racing rpg. I skipped GT 4, was addicted to GT 3, so not sure if its new or not, but its really nice.

So those are my quick impressions. Hope everyone enjoys it also.

Also, theres an update immediately available. I didn't download it as I wanted to play immediately but during a license track the game did crash on me.

 

i'd like to get it with a steering wheel someday

 

my 2c... it's wonderful! the mechanics and simulation aspects are incredible!

i never got so much fun as yesterday's online kart races with any of the forza games... and that is just the very beginning! O_O

 

Yes. Kaz said at the Madrid Launch event last night, that you can expect updates on the next weeks and months. After all the issues, it better have some updates, yes.

As for the patch, it "unlocks" the online mode and fix some minor things. Still be ready for long load times, since their servers are overloaded and the main menu keeps trying to connect to them. Some people even suggest to sign off of PSN, just to "fix" this.

PS: Sony also suggested the temporary "fix": http://ps3.ign.com/articles/113/1136979p1.html

 

Played it over at a friends house, big PSP GT deja vú

What do I mean? does the game sucks? no, its pretty good and fun to play, but the thing is that after all this time waiting, just like the PSP version it feels like too little, too late...

 

There's also a list of bugs/ glitchs at GTP: http://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?t=133955

Some are so dumb i wonder why they weren't noticed. Specially the 3sec Gold license.

 

Too late I understand, but too little?

The only real flaw is the online mode not having matchmaking.

 

Does anyone have comparison screenshots of how bad some of the cars look compared to the premium ones?

 

I'll do a full review when i get the game.

Still, the standards don't have a "standard look". Some look just as pretty as premiums (i'm not kidding), some others look very good to the point you don't notice they're standards), and some look terrible.

I don't understand how difficult would be to recreate those textures in high-definition. Not all of those cars have stickers / decals, as only a group of them were racing cars, and then would take some more time. To be honest, they could've recreated them with high resolution textures in 2, 3 months tops.

Anyway, everybody i talked to said the game is great, the physics is amazing, the weather and day night transition are fantastic... The biggest complaints were the weird freezes, the terrible pixelization that occurs on smoke and water effects behind / beside the cars, and the ridiculously aliased shadows.

I would add:

- Terrible use of licenses (including Top Gear, WRC, Nascar, SuperGT,...)
- Limited customization ( No livery editor, only 17 cars avaiable for race modification, no break tuning,...)
- Lame use of tickets for paint colors and horns.
- Lack of tons of new and cool cars.
- Deep Forest and Trial Mountain look just a little bit better than GT4, which makes me wonder why weren't all GT4 tracks ported ( and that Vision GT / GT HD had playable versions of Twin Ring Motegi, Grand Canyon, Citta Di Aria...). Even one of the recent Red Bull trailers showed El Capitan and Ice Arena, but those tracks aren't in the game.

Still, the game trully shines on the track, as always. It's just a shame that after 5 years, they did lots of mistakes.


EDITED:

Digital Foundry GT5 Tech Analysis (Very interesting and well written article)
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-gran-turismo-5-tech-analysis

Online part:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-11-26-gran-turismo-5-online-article

Eurogamer review:
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-11-24-gran-turismo-5-review

 

GT5 will have matchmaking service in the next update, apparently. Also, it will have speed and weight matching. (Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-11-26-gran-turismo-5-online-article?page=2)